Friday, May 20, 2016

If I Were to Write You

If I were to write you
I would write nonsense
Since words cannot encapsulate you
Cannot trap you on the page

If I were to write you
I would write thunderstorms
Hovering on the salty horizon
A misty moon of indeterminate phase

If I were to write you
I would write grimoires
Strange symbols and dead languages
Bound in skin of goat, fastened in bone

If I were to write you
I would write revolutions
Gilded grocers and dead industrialists
Well-intentioned, starry-eyed

If I were to write you
I would write sunshine
The way it feels after weeks of rain
Like fairy circles we emerge

If I were to write you
I would write voices in the night
Nebulous, magical, chaotic, old, feared, friendly
Smoking transdimensional tobacco

If I were to write you
I would write fire
Aspirations of a resurrected identity
An edition with unexpected additions

If I were to write you
I would write brushstrokes
Canvases of unsettling eyes
Invoking ancient gods with forgotten names

If I were to write you
I would write roses
Budding, blooming, dying, calico and cream
Sweet like whispered words

If I were to write you
I would write home
Stairs creaking in all the expected places
Basement full of discarded selves

If I were to write you
I would write dawn
Or possibly dusk
The betweens you use to wet your brush

If I were to write you
I would write Ionesco
And Dali and Nostradamus and Rube Goldberg
Minds like galaxies

If I were to write you
I would write intangible felines
Prowling through beyond beyonds
Made of shadows, drinking stars

If I were to write you
I would write loose change
Forgotten cell phone chargers
An empty bed

If I were to write you
I would write my whole life
And never run out of words or images
Never paint you fully on the page